


Five-One

by orphan_account



Category: Castle
Genre: Episode Tag, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-17
Updated: 2011-07-17
Packaged: 2017-10-21 12:05:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/224989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Rick Castle saved Kate Beckett's life and one time he didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five-One

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for everything up to the end of season three, and some speculation.
> 
> I know that he's actually saved her life a helluva lot more than five times (not that I'm counting or anything), but a template is a template and all that.
> 
> I apologise for naming this after a certain football score. Couldn't be helped.

1\. _In Books_

 

Her father escaped into a bottle.  She chose a book.  

 

In that time of turmoil books were her safe place.  Some might have thought it strange that she escaped from her own tragedy by reading about fictional murder and mystery, but Kate Beckett didn't care about anyone else's opinion.  To her it made perfect sense.  In books justice was always served.  In books no-one ever gave up until the case was solved.  In books there was always closure.  

 

She couldn't say exactly when _his_ books became her favourite, but at some point she eschewed the likes of James Patterson and Stephen Cannell and concentrated on devouring every book by Richard Castle that she could get her hands on.  

 

There were days when she missed her mother so much that it caused a physical ache deep in her chest.  There were days when she had to drag her father home from a bar and prop him over the toilet, before putting him to bed like a child and cleaning up the mess.  There were days when she felt like she couldn't carry on living and was ready to let go of everything.  On her darkest days she reached for his books.  His books kept her afloat when she could have drowned in the depths of her despair.  

 

Her own story had no resolution, but in his books there was always a happy ending.  

 

 

2\. _A Clean Shot_

 

Only Castle would think of using champagne as a distraction.  She can't fault it though.  His hurried plan works perfectly, as though they're enacting a scene from one of his books.  Castle pops the cork, the gunman is exposed as he tries to return fire and Beckett takes him down.  

 

Castle is excited, sipping champagne as he prattles on about his first gun battle.  While she's secretly grateful that he saved her life (twice in less than fifteen minutes, if she's honest), she swears it'll be his _last_ gun battle.  

 

 

3\. _The Get Out Clause_

 

Castle has never been one for taking the advice of others.  

 

As he enters the smoke-filled lobby he can't help humming a jaunty little tune under his breath.  It's hardly the time or the place, but entering the burning building reminds him of those awful public service commercials that he had to sit through during childhood.  Later, as a parent, he forced Alexis to endure updated versions of the same things.  A cartoon bear, an animated fireman or a chirpy little firetruck would urge all the kids (through the medium of song, naturally) to be prepared for a fire in the home or school.  _Have an escape plan.  Get out and stay out.  Never re-enter a burning building_.  Since he's entering rather than _re_ -entering, he hopes the cheerful cartoon characters will let him off just this once.  

 

Beckett's neighbours pour past him on the stairs.  Some are coughing from the smoke and most seem understandably scared, but nobody looks seriously injured.  He climbs higher, through thickening smoke and increasing structural damage, until he reaches her floor.  The door to her apartment is hot.  Again he ignores the advice of various fire safety professionals and jiggles the handle, trying to open it.  When that doesn't work he throws himself at the door until it collapses under his weight.  It's not as easy as it looks on TV.  

 

Once he's inside it doesn't take long to find her, huddled in the bathtub.  After some wrangling over her unfortunate modesty (her bathrobe is on fire and she's worried about exposing a little skin?) he leads her back through the obstacle course of burning furniture and collapsing walls.  They head down the stairs as he tells her the story of his courageous escapades.  If he embellishes the tale slightly it's only to take her mind off all that is happening.  By the time they reach the lobby the emergency services have arrived and the orange and red lights from the firetrucks outside guide them through the haze of smoke.  

 

As they both emerge safely into the night he offers a silent prayer of thanks to the preachy cartoon characters of his youth and promises not to enter a burning building ever again.  

 

(Unless Beckett's life is in danger.)  

 

 

4\. _Chuck Norris_

 

His hands were made for writing, not for fighting.  He's more comfortable holding a pen than a gun (unless it's a laser gun with flashing lights).  He looks so confused, sitting in the ambulance unwrapping his injured fist and wincing as he makes a mess of the bandages.  She doubts that he's ever suffered this type of injury before.  His hands are the tools of his trade and she suddenly wonders whether they are insured, like Betty Grable's legs or Bruce Springsteen's voice.  It's hardly the time to ask.  

 

She climbs into the ambulance and perches opposite him, stilling his restless hand with a gentle touch.  She glances up at him through her hair as she rewraps the bandages carefully.  It's the least she can do. 

 

"Thank you for having my back in there."  

 

"Always."  

 

 

5\. _Actually I was doing my job; I don't know what the Hell he was doing._

 

" _Castle_."  

 

As the final eight seconds of her life tick away in front of her, she grasps his hand and smiles.  She accepts their fate but she looks into his eyes rather than watching the inevitable countdown.  He stares back, his expression serious, then swallows nervously.  

 

Then he does the stupidest thing that she's ever seen him do in all the years that he's been following her.  It's stupider than not staying in the car when he's told.  It's way beyond using champagne to take down a gunman.  It's more insane than kissing her to distract a sentry.  

 

He grabs a handful of wires and yanks them all away from the dirty bomb.  

 

She flinches, still holding his other hand, braced for an explosion that never happens.  

 

Perhaps the bomb was badly made.  Perhaps Castle is blessed with pure dumb luck.  Whatever the reason, she isn't going to question it.  They are alive.  The city is safe.  

 

The last thing she whispered when she thought they were about to die is the first thing she gasps when she realises that they're going to live.  

 

" _Castle_!"  

 

\--

 

1\. _Don't leave me, Kate._

 

He isn't quick enough.  

 

The light flashes again, something finally clicks in his brain and he jumps.  As the shot rings out he knows that he's a fraction of a second too late.  They hit the ground with a thud that jars his bones but his only concern is Kate.  He knows that she's been hit even before he sees the blood.  Her eyes are darting around, panicky and unfocused, while her breath escapes in wheezing little gasps.  Then he feels her blood on his hands, soaking through her uniform and into his suit.  So much blood.  

 

He'd have taken that bullet for her if he could.  He'd swap places with her in an instant if it would save her life.  He wants to rewrite the scene, switching her name for his, but this isn't fiction and he can't do a damned thing.  

 

He's never felt so helpless.  

 

The ambulance speeds away, lights flashing and sirens wailing.  He doesn't know how he gets to the hospital, but suddenly he's standing in the middle of a busy corridor, an island being buffeted by the current as doctors, nurses, patients and visitors brush past him.  Then he's in a soulless waiting room, sitting on a hard plastic chair and staring at his once-shining black shoes.  Someone has cleaned his hands, wiping Beckett's blood away to leave his skin raw and smelling of antiseptic.  

 

It doesn't matter.  He can still see it.  He's always considered his vivid imagination to be a blessing but right now it's more of a curse.  Over and over he re-lives the moment, cursing himself for being so slow to react.  The flash of light between the headstones was so obviously out of place.  Why didn't he move sooner?  Afterwards he'd been completely useless, just kneeling there, holding her and falling apart.  He should have called 911.  He should have applied pressure to the wound.  He's seen the movies and the TV shows and he knows some basic first aid.  He couldn't have performed surgery but he could have tried to keep her alive long enough for Lanie and the paramedics to reach them.  Instead he panicked and cried and told Kate that he loved her, as if that was going to magically heal her wounds and bring her back to him.  

 

He couldn't save her life this time and all he can do is wait to hear if she has survived anyway.  

 

He and Josh almost come to blows when it becomes clear that her boyfriend won't be operating on Kate.  It's something about _medical ethics_ , but Castle can't see what that's got to do with anything.  Josh loves Kate.  Why won't he help to save her?  Castle would be in there himself if he could.  For a moment he wishes, irrationally, that he'd studied medicine.  Medical ethics be damned, he'd be in there putting her back together again and saving her life.  Kate Beckett is the strongest person he's ever known but right now she needs someone to fight for her.  Someone who loves her.   What better motivation to save a life than love?  

 

Later, when their tempers have cooled, Josh assures Castle that the surgeons working on Kate are the best in the hospital.  Then he disappears in search of an update, promising to return as soon as he has any news.  

 

Castle couldn't save her life.  This time it's up to them.  His mind conjures up an image of faceless strangers in scrubs and masks.  He tells himself that the medical professionals are perfectly capable of doing what he could not.  He clings to that hope as he sits in the uncomfortable chair and studies the cracks in the stained floor.  Nearby his mother perches in a matching chair, holding Jim Beckett's hand and cradling Alexis's head in her lap.  Lanie rests one hand lightly on his daughter's curled up legs, her other hand clinging to Esposito's arm.  Ryan sits shoulder to shoulder with his partner, in a display of brotherly solidarity.  

 

They are all linked, supporting each other in a time of pain.  Castle is the broken link, separated from the chain.  He sits apart from them, staring at the floor and waiting and hoping.  It's all he can do.  

 

 **End**

**Author's Note:**

> I feel the need to mention that I prevaricated about number three. I was torn between the apartment scene at the beginning of _Boom!_ and the bit near the end where Castle shoots Dunn as the serial killer is about to shoot Beckett. Eventually I chose to use the second even though the first is perhaps a more obvious example of Castle saving Beckett.


End file.
